The first photos from Curiosity are starting to trickle in (right), and very soon we’ll start to see scientific data gathered by Curiosity’s on-board science lab, so I thought it would be a good time to discuss the hardware and software that actually makes MSL Curiosity possible.

Hardware

At the heart of Curiosity there is, of course, a computer. In this case the Mars rover is powered by a RAD750, a single-board computer (motherboard, RAM, ROM, and CPU) produced by BAE. The RAD750 has been on the market for more than 10 years, and it’s currently one of the most popular on-board computers for spacecraft. In Curiosity’s case, the CPU is a PowerPC 750 (PowerPC G3 in Mac nomenclature) clocked at around 200MHz — which might seem slow, but it’s still hundreds of times faster than, say, the Apollo Guidance Computer used in the first Moon landings. Also on the motherboard are 256MB of DRAM, and 2GB of flash storage — which will be used to store video and scientific data before transmission to Earth.

The RAD750 can withstand temperatures of between -55 and 70C, and radiation levels up to 1000 gray. Safely ensconced within Curiosity, the temperature and radiation should remain below these levels — but for the sake of redundancy, there’s a second RAD750 that automatically takes over if the first one fails.

Software

On the software side of things, NASA again stuck to tried-and-tested solutions, opting for the 27-year-old VxWorks operating system. VxWorks, developed by Wind River Systems (which was acquired by Intel), is a real-time operating system used in a huge number of embedded systems. The previous Mars rovers (Sojourner, Spirit, Opportunity), Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, and the SpaceX Dragon spacecraft all use VxWorks. VxWorks also powers BMW iDrive, the Apache Longbow helicopter, and the Apple Airport Extreme and Linksys WRT54G routers (really).

I said that VxWorks is 27 years old, but that’s a bit unfair: The initial release was in 1985 (around the same time as MS-DOS 3.0), but it has been in constant development since then, reaching v6.9 last year. Why does Curiosity use VxWorks? It’s reliable, has a mature development toolchain, and presumably its low-level scheduling and interrupt systems are ideal for handling real-time tasks like EDL (entry, descent, and landing; aka, seven minutes of terror).

Instrumentation

MSL Curiosity is quite literally a science lab on wheels, and as such its instrumentation armament is rather insane. There are 17 cameras in total, four of which (the highest-resolution ones) are equipped with 1600×1200 (2-megapixel) CCD sensors. The camera that we’re most interested in is MastCam, which will take high-res true-color images of the Martian landscape, and 720p video at 10 fps. Looking down rather than out, the Mars Hand Lens Imager, which is attached to the robotic arm, will take microscopic images of the soil and rock beneath Curiosity.

Science-wise, the most important camera is probably ChemCam, which will vaporize rocks and soil with an infrared laser, and then use spectroscopy to analyze the sample. There are lots of other spectrometers on-board, too, a radiation monitor, a water/hydrogen detector, and an instrument suite (chemistry set?) that will analyze samples that are scooped up from the ground.

Until MastCam is raised — which should happen in the next day or two — most of the imagery we will receive from Curiosity comes from the hazard avoidance cameras, or Hazcams. These are grayscale cameras attached to the four corners of Curiosity, which build up a 3D map of the rover’s surroundings. This map is then used to autonomously navigate around hazards (rocks larger than 75cm or so, chasms, little green men, etc.)

Communication

Beyond the landing procedure — which we’ve discussed in the past — by far the coolest aspect of Curiosity is that we’re controlling a human-made robot that’s up to 250 million miles away, and in turn it will send back terabytes of data over the next few years.

As you can imagine, transmitting data over 250 million miles requires a lot of power. Curiosity generates 125 watts of electricity from a 2000-watt plutonium-based radioisotope thermoelectric generator. Waste heat is used to keep the MSL’s systems at optimum temperature.

Curiosity can either communicate directly with Earth’s Deep Space Network (DSN) antenna via an X band (8GHz) link, or it can use a UHF (300MHz-3GHz) transmitter to relay signals through Mars Odyssey and Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, which orbit a few hundred miles above Curiosity. Because it’s a lot cheaper for Curiosity to use UHF, and because the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter has a very-high-speed 6Mbps X band antenna, relaying will be Curiosity’s main way of sending data back to Earth.

The next few days

While we’re fairly certain that Curiosity made a perfect landing on Mars, NASA will now spend the next few days confirming it. Once mission control is convinced that Curiosity hasn’t landed on the edge of a crevasse or a pit of quicksand, the mast, robotic arm, and high-gain antenna will be deployed. In a week or so, we should be looking at the first high-res panoramas created by MastCam. In the next few days we’re also expecting a photo taken by the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter of Curiosity’s descent and landing. If you didn’t know, MRO is equipped with HiRISE, an 800-megapixel camera that shoots 2-gigabyte photos.

Eventually, we’ll even get some movies of Curiosity roving across the surface of the Red Planet at a heady 90 meters per hour. I wouldn’t be surprised if, in a few years, you can see Curiosity: The Movie at your local IMAX theater.

Updated: Added: Multiple photos taken by Curiosity; a new photo of Curiosity, taken by Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, during descent; and a video captured by Curiosity itself, during its last two minutes of descent.

Updated again: Added a very cool photo of the Curiosity landing site, taken by the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter. You can see all the debris, including the sky crane, heat shield, etc. Also added the first high-resolution image of the Martian surface, taken by one of the black and white navigation cameras.

The edge of Gale Crater can be seen in the distance. Shot by Curiosity's black and white navigation camera.

Curiosity's landing site, and the remains of its various EDL stages, shot by the MRO

The first color photo taken by Curiosity, shot by the Mars Hand Lens Imager (MAHLI)

Tagged In

Please Extreme don’t compare this to an Apple computer. We don’t need another comparison to that pathetic company. Let just use a generic name instead of giving Apple free publicity. Frankly I’d rather not see an Apple powered computer on a space craft, you’ll fly there but you’d never know if your gonna crash it just does without warning.

Vincent Lalande-Bériault

Soooooooooooooo tired of articles that compares EVERYTHING to Apple products… I sympathize…

You really don’t understand anything involving NASA and tech do you? Curiosity has been in development for YEARS. The hardware used inside of it is radiation hardened. Know what that means? Most radiation hardened processors or electronics are slower than what we have on Earth, mainly because they have to be slightly modified to reduce the possible damage done to them by cosmic and solar radiation. Also, Curiosity has limited power to run on and has to prioritize. Your precious Apple Airport Extreme doesn’t have as much of a limitation. Of course it’s going to be faster.

So you want to REALLY compare your Airport with Curiosity? Why don’t you put wheels on your Airport and launch it to Mars. IF you managed to get it into orbit or beyond, your airport wouldn’t even work. It would be fried the minute it powered on.

Your stupid headline paired with your stupid comment above insults the MANY engineers and technicians that have worked on this project.

But I think it’s amusing that, ultimately, Curiosity is just a wireless router with some cameras attached to it.

If you look elsewhere on the site, you will see plenty of breathless coverage, with regard to NASA, space exploration, Curiosity, etc. Don’t focus too heavily on the title. Hopefully you read the story itself, too!

“Curiosity is just a wireless router with some cameras attached to it.” Yeah, that’s not insulting, or completely wrong.

rem120

It’s not a wireless router! It just happens to have the same operating system as a wireless router, but it has different hardware and different applications. By your logic you could say Curiosity is just an attack helicopter.

You already know that, of course. You just wrote that headline because you know it would bait people into getting you page views. I’m sure the numbers will look good for you and your boss, but this dumbing down of journalism is why many people don’t take online seriously, and why while people will read online for free most will never pay. Well done.

JohnnyXP64

well since everyone got a stupid mac, self appoint them selfs “Senior Editor, ExtremeTech” and at the same time they think is “funny” to call Curiosity just a WiFi router with Cams on it,
and they promote their “articles” through the “code project” that is mainly targeting Code Gurus and Engineers,

saws us that the freedom of the internet, and that everyone even the ignorant now have a “blog”,
is not that good after all :(what a waste.

variable455

dude. just make it a Linksys.

some_guy_said

Unless he changed it, I see that radiation is mentioned and factored.

If you want to see a really terrible comparison, there’s one on Gizmodo, saying that the iphone is 4 times faster than curiosity because the iphone runs at 800 Mhz and the rover runs at 200Mhz.

and then, there’s no other relevant info on it. At all. It’s such a bad apple fluff comparison, it makes me want to bang my head against the wall.

Radiation was not factored in. There was a mention of radiation shielding and a redundant system in case the primary failed. The ONLY thing Curiosity has to do with the Airport extreme is the software used, which is also used in Linksys routers, other space faring probes, etc…

I agree. HORRIBLE Apple fluff.

Sebastian, I hope you do not call yourself a journalist, because even a simple student newspaper at a high school would have called you out on that one.

Although I agree that the comparison in the title of this article is kind of stupid, you’d notice that the actual article doesn’t really mention apple and is focused instead on the hardware in curiosity anyways…

I was thinking that there was some Mac code on the Rover, which got me curious. There is nothing Apple on this thing, so I agree its a bad title, bad comparison, and makes the article less professional. Not to mention the fact that I haven’s seen a bunch of AirPort pucks moving around my street collecting rock samples.

Using the landing to see how far we have come in robotics would of made the article a lot more interesting then saying its an AirPort. the DARPA challenge, a comparison to earth side deep sea rovers, would all make for more interesting read.

When you say Apple I expect Apple hardware and/or code on the rover. Without that the title just looks like a big bold advertisement for apple, which makes me move Extremetech down on my list of dependable unbiased coverage.

There’s still good stuff here, but doing titles like this makes me question the validity of anything apple related on this sight.

Mike Scott

Apple Doesn’t Make any Hardware. It’s all subcontracted. People just like to call it Apple because of their pretty Logo and Totalitarian attitude.

Dan Andersen

It’s true, Mike! Neither do HP, Dell, Asus, Lenovo or any other names we’re familiar with “Make any Hardware.” You have to look inside to see the names on the chips, right? Then you’ll know, right? You’re so smart, Mike! The only important thing is the factory where the chips are made. That’s the secret. Right?

You do know you are wrong don’t you? Apple makes plenty of hardware. They have been developing hardware themselves and with other companies for years.

Take the PowerPC processor in this article, that was developed by Apple with IBM and Motorola. The processors within Apples mobile devices (iPhone, iPod Touch and iPad) are all custom processors developed and manufactured by Apple. All the batteries in every Apple portable device (iPhone through to MacBook) are all designed, tested and (you’ve guessed it) manufactured by Apple.Before you try to join a flame war on Apple I advise that you do some research rather than posting an inane comment that makes you sound like a blithering idiot. Please learn how to use your Internet Explorer and the English language.

Phoenix

you do realise the CPUs are designed by Apple and manufactured by Samsung?
and most of their products are manufactured by Foxconn..

Three things going on here:
1) Apple paid for this headline. (My comment will be removed for this comment, probably).
2) Those who THINK they know anything about technology are offended by the comparison.
3) Those who DO know anything about technology are amazed NASA pulled off Curiosity with such limited hardware as is available in radiation-hardened hardware.

and many of them also use PC. In fact, there are a few PCs in the JPL photo too…

ArgusSeesAll

Last time I checked, JPL has about 15K computers, and the breakdown by platform is roughly 1/3 Mac, 1/3 Windows, 1/3 whatever ( whatever = Solaris, Linux, a handful of supercomputers or clusters). The push to move to clouds / VM’s has been happening for several years. ALL flight operations are run on Solaris / Linux. Mac laptops are very popular, Windows is more common on the desktop. Yes, I work @ JPL. No, I am not officially allowed to speak for JPL, so I won’t answer any questions about current / past projects.

Dan Andersen

Absolutely, Nikita! Also, I’m really glad those brilliant engineers and designers use PCs to do their work! (Oh, wait…)

Yes they are. Cameras taken onto the International Space Station get weird pixel artifacts if used long enough. This is caused by the sensor on the camera being damaged by solar and cosmic radiation. The same would apply for a CCD sensor on a space faring probe.

Boy, it’s amazing people are allowed to live in a place where there’s so much radiation it kills cameras so easily.

I have seen what the space station crew wears… doesn’t look like protective gear to me…

I wonder if there is another explanation?

Andrew Lowish

NASA is only using the best available computer hardware. If it had been built with PC hardware Curiosity would have crashed on Venus by now.

Sean Young

It doesn’t use Apple hardware, and while we’re on the subject Apple uses the IBM compatible Intel based architecture these days, so they are, in a very real sense, just PCs, fancy Dells with a over inflated price tag.

97point6

People relax, it was simply a hook to hang the story on. And not a bad job at that, worked for me Sebastian, nice collection of material. And in the future PC crowd, try to be a bit more PC.

LOL look at all the haters! Stop hating! If they wanted to they could have used a Pentium 4 chip or a 486 chip or something else that used to be in Windows PC hardware. BUT THEY DIDN’T. They chose the same chip as an old Apple Power Mac G3. Don’t hate. Congratulate!

Yoduh99

It’s not the same chip. Curiosity uses a RAD750. Mac G3 uses a PowerPC 750. Neither is an “Apple” chip as they were both designed and manufactured by IBM. One is $45, the other is $200,000+

I guess You’d say that the Hubble Telescope was a failure because it didn’t use a G3 processor? It started with a i386 CPU and now is running on a 486 CPU.

Computers on ISS run i386 chips.

The simple fact is that the CPUs are usually slower and proven radiation hardened processors. The old PPC750 is a great processor. And it was used because of its power consumption and efficiency in dealing with the UHF transmissions it must route.

It has nothing to do with Mac or PC.

The headline was just bad writing, only to be used to make the fanboi’s head explode with distortion field induced superiority and to also inflame who you call the “haters”, which are out there calling out people like Sebastian for a lack of journalistic integrity.

Matt_in_FL

Actually, I think it is YOU that they were aiming for. Cuz you know. You’re here. Commenting and stuff. Probably linking to this article to say how terrible it is. You’re part of the problem, mate. Just sayin’.

Personally, I thought the article did a good job of explaining that it wasn’t really a G3 in there. The title of the article is pure link bait (as all titles are these days), but it wasn’t a terrible story. I feel somewhat more informed than I was before I read it and I’m not at all thinking that there’s a giant Apple computer and router wandering around on Mars.

Yep. Did you ever stop to think that maybe… the title was intentional?

Matt_in_FL

Obviously they are in the business of trying to get people to read their stories… and obviously, that works. That’s all I’m saying. It’s part of the game now. When you read a link title, assume that there’s probably a twist to it. They’re not meant to actually be informative, just get you to read the article, which hopefully is.

Those JPL engineers weren’t doing anything worthwhile on those overexpensive macbook gadgets. They were only looking at telemetry data, using the mac as a fancy terminal. Anything that involves reliably sending commands to Mars, receiving data from Mars and crunching data from Mars and from the Large Hadron Collider, 100% of that happens on Linux machines, Linux clusters and embedded systems.

Phalougher

Almost everyone in the room was just using toys, then, to control the landing of the spacecraft. Got it.

You need to learn about planets and the speed of light. Those engineers were not controlling the landing of the spacecraft, they were just looking at some telemetry data coming back, kind of like they were using the $2000 Macbooks to watch a youtube video, that’s pretty much the type extent they were used for. But you bogus Apple fanboys just go ahead, you need to write that NASA landed the Apple robot on Mars using Apple remote control computers, it’ll make you feel so good to be a sucker.

Phalougher

So your contention is that multiple NASA technicians, as proven by photographic evidence, are also suckers. Do they need to learn about “planets and the speed of light” as well? I’m sure you would be just the person to educate them. Perhaps you could get a job in the lab, as a janitor or something.

I don’t need to teach them anything. They aren’t the ones saying they use Apple hardware to send the MSL rover to Mars. I need to teach people like you about the fact that those bogus computers aren’t being used to remote control the friggen rover. Commands take 14 minutes to be sent to the rover, and it takes the rover 7 minutes to land, you should be able to figure out yourself that those Macbooks are absolutely useless in doing anything else than just showing a bit of telemetry data. Something you could do on any Chromebook, Windows PC or whatever. Apple hardware is never used for anything worthwhile on this planet nor on any other planet.

Gaaaare

A NASA Dude

Phalougher

Still there, Charbax? I just had to revisit with this new link: http://idealab.talkingpointsmemo.com/2012/08/mars-curiosity-rover-team-spills-mission-details-on-reddit.php?ref=fpnewsfeed. Highlights include “Specifically, the science and engineering team appears to favor Apple Macbook Pro laptops, based on a photo they provided during the Reddit AMA.” and “Other members of the larger Curiosity team also to favor Apple Macbook Pros, according to a screenshot captured by a Reddit user of NASA’s live feed of the entry, descent and landing phase process on August 6.” Strangely, the article never features (*Note: Telemetry information only)” after any of these responses. I know enough to walk away from an obvious troll when I did, but this was just too good to pass up. Don’t feel bad, though; have another bag of Cheetos or two, and write a Linux program to calculate the average height of all the Doctor Whos or something; you’ll feel better.

It’s a fact they did not send any data with those Macbooks during the entry decent and landing. That’s llike fact number one of Mars science. But hey, you just believe that those photographed overpriced Macbooks were uses for anything more than to display telemetry data. The actual sending of commands to Mars rovers is absolutely NEVER done using Apple hardware, absolutely NEVER. Nor is any of the actual real science ever computed, received not processed on Apple hardware. But you go ahead, buy a hugely overpriced Mac and feel like anything else than a sucker.

John Pombrio

Nice article Sebastian! This is the first article I have seen of the brains of the rover. As for its capabilities, it is KISS and Just Enough Technology for the job at hand. The Shuttle for a long time had core memory in its computers and look at what they accomplished. Its not the power or the speed but what you do with it that counts.
I have worked on board testers used on both military aircraft boards and spacecraft boards. They are built completely differently to prevent EMP from bringing the aircraft down and harsh radiation from causing memory problems. One side of the board is a solid slug of metal to accomplish this.They are also tested to extreme conditions and can handle the rough and tumble of flight and rocket launches. They are made to WORK, no matter what.

I was more than alright with your criticisms of the actual article, but posting replies like this is uncalled for. These types of replies do not actually add to the threaded discussion, but detract from it…and I am sure you know it. I am rather saddened that I even feel strongly enough to reply to this, but your childish antics in this thread have been hurting your own reputation.

Maybe you can sleep well tonight knowing you at least got under some random person’s skin on the internet.

Though, I did enjoy reading your replies when they were on topic. I would only suggest focusing more on the information rather than bashing the poster. I can’t wait for your reply!

As for the software, again I have experience with the military’s and NASA’s view. They don’t change ANYTHING without a writ from GOD himself. You go with the most trusted and tested of software and programming and you stay with it. Losing an aircraft or spaceshot over software issues created by committee is just plain stupid. It is thankfully a rare event (and yes, I know that the polar explorer crashed due to just this reason).

James Tolson

Vxworks hmm, wise choice i guess, can you imagine though if they opted for windows.. the first image they received would be 2 thirds of a pic of a blue screen of death.. before the rover crashes into a million pieces on the surface….

Lots of negativity for a simple connection. Sure the tech community is tired of this, but how many average users have set up a router? Most people are not even aware that there is a computer inside every fax, printer, router, cell phone, tv, and car. Back in the day you had to set the choke, crank a handle and make sure the gas was flowing into your carb. Now you push a button and you car runs. Getting all excited because someone points out the similarities between an exotic usage and an everyday usage for a processor is just silly.

Right on the mark. The closest thing this has to Apple is the BAE computer on board based on PowerPC that Apple ditched, making the product closer to IBM. The OS is used in way to many industries to be considered apple, and there is no Airplay hardware on board this guy, however the title makes it sound like the rover has apple hardware somewhere in it, and that this hardware is very important to the function of the vehicle.

Its extremely misleading, gives credit where its not earned, and in a way downplays the engineering efforts of the people involved, and the article has NOTHING apple inside it (The PowerPC component is a BAE computer) making the title nothing more then an advertisement attached to one of the biggest leaps in exploring our solar system.

People will see the title, some wont bother reading it, but they will quote the title despite not know whats inside. Its a good article, but the title just steams propaganda intentional or not.

Man, the comments are seriously stupid this time around. Obviously the reference to Apple was link bait but the people questioning Sebastian’s journalistic integrity must not be frequent readers of ET and can promptly go back to the sensationalism written on Giz.

I read ET frequently. It’s on my google reader subscription list. I have also worked for a real news organization. You are damned right I’m questioning his journalistic integrity. No one at a respectable organization would have allowed such a misleading headline… unless they were a tabloid.

Don’t try to apply the rules of print publishing to the web — bit silly.
In this case, I just wanted to use a fun title — no other reason. ‘Inside NASA’s Curiosity’ is the ‘meat’ of the title — the rest… not so much :)

If you really read ET frequently, you’d know every 5th article is about something Apple just because they enjoy their products. I knew the comparison was going to be a stretch but I’m not overly offended about it like you are.

But you must not have anything else to do today besides continually refreshing the page to add your opinion to every new comment made on this story.

I’m offended by it because I have some good friends who have worked on Curiosity. I also have ET on my list of blogs to read. Personally, I don’t like Apple too much, but I do like to keep myself informed about them, and as much as I hate to say it, ET is a decent source for Apple news that’s not as biased as something like Jizzmodo or Apple Insider. The headline piqued my interest because I was pretty sure that no Apple hardware was in Curiosity.

BTW: I don’t read/listen/pay attention to FoxNoise.

Michael Garrett

I know your an Android guy so I can see where you’re coming from (It’s a little creepy that I can see every comment you’ve ever made with Disqus). I would say take these headlines with a grain of salt because the meat of the article was very informative.

I was looking for details on the cameras yesterday after I learned of the CPU specs. I was hoping the optics would be more exciting given that they spent all this time and money to get the rover up there. I’d hate to receive grainy photos and video back that’s worse than my old Motorola V600.

As I mentioned before, the optics can only last so long before the CCD degrades. it’s especially evident in some of the super high resolution cameras you’d find on ISS like the large format Hasselblads. The sensors are HUGE and much more prone to damage by radiation. The cameras and sensors are smaller on probes to help extend the lifespan of the cameras. That’s why you see a lot of smaller photos all stitched together to make larger ones. it’s a real shame that this happens, but until we develop better camera sensors that aren’t as susceptible to radiation… this is the way it has to be.

Terry, Michael was making a comment about how he wished there could be higher resolution cameras on the probes, considering the level of quality with our current earth-based digital cameras. I explained to him one reason why it’s the way it is.
It helps that I’m also a professional photographer. Did you see me waving my pedigree around?
Thanks for the smart compliment.
Oh yes, I’m not really uptight. I’m just stating fact and defending my friends who have worked on the project.

There’s a WRT54G version running Linux – I don’t mean dd-wrt, I mean the original firmware is a dd-wrt adaptation done by Linksys. It’s now outdated, but in its time it was one of the most popular wireless routers available.

Maruko M

Please stop referencing such a pathetic and backwards company such as Apple in stories like this. The intelligent guys over at NASA would never stoop this low nor would they be ignorant enough to use them during work. Seriously just take a look for yourself. Not a single Apple computer being used.

Next time take a hint from starred commentators such as Blake Bilton and perhaps mention Android next time? With their open source software, it can potentially be used to operate future devices we send out into space.

I used to do development on vxWorks for an aerospace company. There are a lot of good reasons that this operating system and processor are used for safety critical applications. At high altitude (and I imagine even more so with no atmosphere), CPUs running at higher frequencies are more susceptible to Single Event Upsets. Additionally, a high clock speed isn’t as important for this operating system, because the scheduler is very strict. Each application is given a set time slice and must complete its work within that time slice. And of course, this platform will have gone through years of testing and verification. Using a known, proven CPU is key to being able to certify the platform.

Think of it this way: would you rather the navigation system in the aircraft you’re flying in is using the fastest CPU that Intel just released last month or the tried-and-true processor that has been tested and vetted over the course of 10 years?

As an aside: you cannot imagine the amount of effort that goes into not just developing a critical software platform like this, but also verifying it. In my experience, development is around 10-15% of the schedule; the rest is testing and verification, verification, verification. I applaud the people that continue to do this type of work; all the documentation and verification was too much for me.

I hope you do write that followup on safety critical systems. I don’t see a whole lot of coverage in the mainstream tech sites even though there’s some really fascinating engineering that goes into them.

Terry, Michael was making a comment about how he wished there could be higher resolution cameras on the probes, considering the level of quality with our current earth-based digital cameras. I explained to him one reason why it’s the way it is.

It helps that I’m also a professional photographer. Did you see me waving my pedigree around?

Thanks for the smart compliment.

Oh yes, I’m not really uptight. I’m just stating fact and defending my friends who have worked on the project.

Come on, Apple-haters. You’ve got an extreme sensitivity. You don’t like Apple. We know. Since the ungodly JPL has a lot of Apple computers to do their work, and the chip(s) in it are PowerPC vintage 1998, the comparison to an Airport Extreme is kind of natural. Calm down. A Mac doesn’t give you rabies — or does it?

rg57

The RAD750 can withstand temperatures of between -55 and 70C

Wow. Temperature in Coulombs! That is high tech.

Alex Bruski

Celsius not Coulombs! Some will argue Centigrade, but Celsius is the newer preferred terminology. 0 Celsius is the temperature that water freezes at and 100 Celsius is the temperature that water boils in one standard atmosphere of pressure. -55 and 70 C is the same as -67 and 158 Degrees Fahrenheit. Did you know that 0 F is the temperature of equal weight of snow and salt combined in one atmosphere of pressure. Can anyone explain what difference a change in pressure makes to the temperature of the salt-snow mixture?

Garydp

When it stop communicating one day we’ll know why, it’s Apple powered it doesn’t tell you what happened it just closes the app. For Extreme Tech they shouldn’t even remotely confuse that Apple even had anything to do with PowerPC processor. They didn’t invent the processor and why give Apple credit.

left_field123

While I could care less about Apple, the ironic thing is that your statement is 100% false. The PowerPC processor was jointly created by Apple, IBM & Motorola. Read the first sentence of the wiki page: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PowerPC

Ben Himberg

As has been stated multiple times, the article title is very misleading BUT catchy. Certainly sensationalist covers it well enough.

‘Apple hardware’ isn’t any different from PC hardware these days, except that more thought is put into case design. Though they do have a few things, such as mag locked power cables, going for them. That and their ACPI implementation.

‘Apple software’ isn’t all that different from *nix. Basically a nifty GUI wrapped around a unix core. Still, it is the worst of both worlds in that regard: a friendly (read: restrictive) GUI wrapped around a DRM mess sprinkled with the incompatibilities *nix users have come to accept. Objective C is a pleasure to program with. Beyond that, their support of OpenCL has a net positive effect (and will hopefully beat out amp++, though I’m not holding my breath). Without the DRM, I would take it over Microsoft anything.

A friend of mine wrote some code for the LHC. She used a Macbook. Another friend studies chaos theory via Matlab on an apple desktop. Myself, I’ve written algorithms using OpenCL in OS X (on my PC). The point is that, and going by some of the statements here this must be a surprise, people do use Apple products in productive ways. They could be equally productive, probably more so, in Linux but still, it happens.

I simply don’t like the business model: all about image with performance as an afterthought. I get way more performance for far less money with Linux.

While the comparison with everyday items gives interesting disparities, it is the significance of the differences that are more important. See http://all-things-pure.blogspot.com/2010/10/your-old-notebook-alone-is-overkill-to.html

I am surprised that it’s only 300,000 lines of code. I would think that even for EDL alone, much more would be needed for all those autonomous decisions to manage all the environmental factors.

Alex Bruski

I used to do programming in the mid 80’s. Things have changed a lot since then, but programming robotic actions to accomplish a discrete task don’t take a lot of code. The majority of the code, I would imagine, is for the areas of interaction with the unknown. Interpreting camera images for collision detection. Determining the best path to get to a prescribed destination over unknown terrain. Dealing with possible outcomes where there are limitless outside influences that can cause what you think should happen to not be what actually happens. Wind storms, soft or sticky ground, obstacles in the path that virtually block all direct paths of movement, etcetera.

It uses a PowerPC processor which was developed by Apple with IBM and Motorola. Therefore it does use Apple hardware.

ragething

may i just say. Please remember that the OS and processors used in this system have little to do with apple other than the routing that they do so well. They are not really doing much in the way of massive CPU cycles processing huge reams of data. Its whole purpose is to be able to relate data quickly and without error. clock speeds are irrelevant. Accurate real time data needs good bandwidth and quick response. As an old amiga fan i was smitten to find the old 68000 sitting inside a cisco systems router i was trained on. why? a 10 year old CPU plugged into a mundane multitask of passing data about? because that’s what it does best. The PowerPC cpu is a mere single line risc processor. It isnt really the CPU.. its more of a secondary dedicated CPU to do grunt work such as processing data without a need for an instant answer……the real brains will be the controller chip that ties all this telemetry together and keeping all systems functioning.

Its the bridge that is the real hero in this piece. BAE PowerPCI.

BigMike57

A great article spoiled by an utterly retarded headline.

You’d have been just as accurate as saying “It’s an APACHE. With LASERS. IN SPACE. *key Ride of the Valkyries*”.

The people seens happy cause the robot landed in mars, celebrating this stupid thing, trying to descorevy life in another planet, spending so much money, and here, we have millions and millions of people dying hungry because they don’t have any single piece of bread to eat. I am shame on you.

dmarcoot

Of all the things that are wasteful in the world to find shameful, you choose this? You are an idiot.

Sean Tyson

Actually, I would say the “heart” of curiosity is its plutonium-238-fueld Multi-Mission Radioisotope Thermoelectric Generator, or MMRTP, without which it would have a much lower level of performance, and some of its equipment might not operate at all.

kerrcad

Holy crap! I’m just Joe average citizen and everyone seems to be missing the point – NASA achieved an incredible feat! People like me want to know about it in whatever detail we can get our hands on – I cared about the word “Curiosity” in the headline and noting else matters. The posts by the truly experienced folks that provided more detail were great and informative. Having to sift though a bunch of mindless crap about “headlines” and “links” to get to something interesting was unbelievably annoying. Thanks for the great article and thanks to those adding intelligent comments.

Thanks for taking the time to comment :) I apologise for the crappy title-related comments you had to trawl through!

Petr Antoš

hi, greatly provocative slug purpose is good to attract readers on very nice article about Curiosity inside and discussion below about fruit marketing company oriented to gauss curve driven consumers gang is totally stupid, as usuall :-), hopefully(?) the company at least sponosors JPL by their fasioned terminals equipped by the hyperthropic big white-led fruit advertising on it for free …. hopefully(?) :-)), BTW NASA also needs some kind of public marketing to survive its Orion and future at all, so everything public is also for the masses … real rocket science is happening deep behind this nice shell …. using VxWorks RTOS, and for sure some managed command interpreters on top of it, they selected industrial device proven by years, not any consumer oriented Linux, MacOS or Windows (but nothing can prevent to select WinCE driven system if proven also, its also RTOS, no other current consumer OS kernel is RealTimeOS capable from scratch, no other ….)

said_what

That really is not a good title or connection.

Brian(aka brianzion) Carr

i think its a good account of curiosity i dont think the title is offensive to apple more a bit of fun :)

Bradley Finn

Really, Curiosity uses old POS hardware. It doesn’t have radiation shielding, the whole housing has radiation shielding. There would be much better newer tech that would use less power. Just get over it NASA is a private company with goals that need to be set. They obviously don’t care about the hardware of these units as it would just be a cost factor. The hardware is obviously tested and works well and they wouldn’t have the budget to develop something better. All you NASA fan boys need to get over it and realise that NASA basically used junk hardware to save money.

I’m amazed so many people are butthurt of a mention of Apple hardware containing the same processor.

It was just a comparison intended to draw page views, stop reading so much into it and comment on the actual article and the amazing feat NASA pulled off instead of raging over a small Apple mention.

Dennis van Mierlo

Perfectly described. It is a really huge accomplishment what NASA has done here. It is just amazing.

AndrewS1957

Agreed…get over the Apple references, angry idiots and look at what these people have accomplished….it is nothing short of remarkable.

RepublicOfTwo

” Agreed…get over the Apple references, angry idiots and look at what
these people have accomplished….it is nothing short of remarkable.”

Remarkable? *Miracle.* That’s 250 million miles through space. That’s not the space in one’s basement, that’s space blasted by debris moving at tens of thousands of mph relative to the rover, with heat/cold/radiation that would instantly kill an unshielded human, on a complicated trajectory influenced by the gravitational pull of several planets, their moons, the sun, the orbits of each of these objects, and the planetary rotation at the launch and landing sites.

To communicate with it, radio signals must be sent to a distance greater ten thousand trips circling around Earch, or about a million times further than the largest antenna (like house sized) could receive a TV station. To get a signal coming back, a radio/antenna combo weighing a few pounds must reach those 250 million miles back, and aim that signal to Earth. The rover’s computer system can never become fully locked up; if it’s too frozen to respond to remote commands and hung in such a way that the backup computer doesn’t recognize it, one can’t exactly walk the 250M miles to the server room. It’s just gotta work, under conditions it can’t be fully tested for.
And that’s the easy version.

11 yrs ago the powerpc 750 was ahead of it’s time. I can see why NASA chose to engineer it into the Curiosity rover. It’s efficient, it doesn’t take much power to run, and it’s stable. Powerpc is still being used today… many still mention the advantage of RISC over x86. More advanced Powerpc’s are inside every Xbox 360, Nintendo Wii, and Sony Playstation 3. The military has been using them in some of their uav drones. And most of the mobile phones we carry are using ARM architecture (based off RISC and influenced by powerpc.)

Bcoday

Nice article. I started reading some of the comments (which is always a mistake it seems) and am just perplexed by the tendency of people to be so negative, biased, and ignorant. Hopefully, you don’t allow comments from these kinds of people to bother you at all. Thanks for taking the time to write, inform and, yes, entertain your readers. I appreciate your efforts!

So when we want to take a sample of a rock we will have to purchase an app through the app store so Apple gets their cut? Or are you saying its like an Airport because of the cost?

Silver Surfer

What I think is pathetic is the fact that guys who are “Windows” lovers actually consider themselves computer geeks and love to bash Apple all the time. Really? Need I remind you, the best geeks will run UNIX and MAC’s are all running BSD under the skin. Window OS is pure garbage and the main reason why Malware has been able to infiltrate practically every government network, because they decided to run such a poorly designed operating system to being with.

OS X, Linux MINT, and BackTrack are primarily the OS’s that any serious minded security analyst will run in their toolkit arsenal – NOT WINDBLOWS! They actually run WINDBLOWS in an VM under VirtualBox to analyze these Malware threats. Despite what you want to think about Apple; compare how many Malware threats infected Windows vs. OS X in the last 2 years. Big Big difference, you do the math and then pick the more secure platform!Also, Apple builds solid hardware, unlike all the crap that DELL, ACER, and HP sell these days – which last for 2 years tops. My MBP is going on 3 years and still runs 100% prime. An average MBP will last 5 years and you can still sell it on eBay for a decent price.

That is the ONLY reason it is not chock full of malware… it has nothing to do with IF it is infectable or superior in any way.

Don’t be delusional…

Linux is infectable, it’s just not a big target, and OS X is a tinier target still…

Move along, nothing to see there….

Besides, the OS X users already ran out of money paying the apple tax.. so they don’t need to be raped any more by malware…. LOL

More importantly, this line of discussion is off topic for this article…. We SHOULD be discussing Curiosity and it’s space hardened hardware and software, not why you think OS X is superior. (It’s not. It is the same as any other OS. It has flaws that can be exploited. It has been exploited, but the LOW number of worldwide users makes it a less desirable target. YOU do the math.)

I did the math long ago… and my PC’s, both Windows and Linux, are all protected and secure. It’s not hard to achieve.

Now, if I were in space things would be different..

Back to Curiosity…

It has a color camera, so, why were not all of the cameras color? (except thermal imaging and mapping cameras, etc.) If data storage or transmission bandwidth is the concern then the image could be selectable B/W or Color…

The limitation didn’t save much weight or cost….

oh well…

Eric

ArgusSeesAll

Charbax is both right and wrong. It
takes close to 16 mins, one-way, to transmit to Mars, so the control systems
ARE NOT real time, but programmed and sequenced in advanced. In this case, yes,
those laptops you see are not being used to control MSL. But Charbax, knock it
off with the Apple hate, yeah? Apple makes damn nice laptops, and yes, they are
worth the extra cost. This type of argument of relative value is stupid. When
ANY of the IT guys around here start shooting off their mouths re: the
superiority of Macs vs. Windows vs. Unix / Linux, I immediately mentally
classify them as hacks. A true professional uses what is best for the job, or what is provided, and doesn’t
waste time with opinions. Don’t like Macs? That’s cool, don’t buy one. Do you lust for / drive a BMW, Audi, Benz? Why? A
Yugo, at least in theory, can get you to where you need to go.

ArgusSeesAll

*&^!$#@ I meant to respond to Charbax, not start a new topic, I guess this is why I don’t work for JPL’s public media or outreach groups.

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